What Happened To Me?

[sue1234]

Last night I ate egg drop soup and two egg rolls. I used probably two teaspoons of soy sauce to dip the egg rolls in. I only drank maybe a cup of water after eating because I had to attend a school event for my daughter who is a senior(it was air conditioned, thank goodness!). Then when I got home I drank a little more. Before bed I felt my hands swelling and I felt hot, just like what happens when I step outside in our southern summer heat. It was only 78 degrees in my home. I quickly turned our a/c down for the cool sleeping conditions and got ready for bed.

This morning I wake up and immediately feel "off"--a little tachy and lightheaded more than usual. I still feel that way, plus some hand and feet swelling, and feel warmer than usual, but not fever.

I thought sodium was supposed to be our friend?!? Was this most likely from the soy sauce? I have no thyroid, so it is not a thyroid issue. I have eaten soy sauce many times and not had an issue with it.

I really feel like my POTS symptoms are from not enough volume, so why would extra sodium "hurt" me?

It's like I have vasodilation and it won't quit with the fan blowing on me. Any ideas?

[firewatcher]

MSG

[lieze]

I really have to watch what I eat too-it's throwing me off.

[Guest tearose]

Yes, they do use tons of salt, sodium and starches in Chinese food. You can simply ask if they use msg or not. Most restaurants around here do not use msg.

You may just have overdone the sodium and your body couldn't handle it.

[MomtoGiuliana]

This happened to me once after eating out. I felt ok the night before and woke up feeling horrible with severe POTS symptoms. I did also wonder if it was MSG.

Keep in mind too that when you over-do salt your body excretes potassium. You can cause a slight imbalance of your electrolytes with too much salt intake. I did not realize this until recently when my EP told me this.

[issie]

I Second the......MSG!

[sue1234]

When I read MSG from Firewatcher, I thought probably so. But, here I am 3 days later, and the symptoms are worse! I am now having to keep my a/c on constantly and a fan blowing on me as I feel like I am vasodilating with my hands and feet swelling, and this all makes me feel faint. You would think I was standing around in 90 degree weather!!!! I put in a call to my cardio to see if he has any idea what is going on.

Do others have vasodilation for no good reason? How do you control it?

[HopefulLady]

Oh yeah baby MSG!!! I have to stay away from that stuff it sends me into a spell of dizziness and tachycardia. When I order chinese food I tell them NO MSG!!! There are a lot of things that have MSG in them so you have to be careful.

[poppetkazutaka]

I can't eat Chinese food because of the MSG, it does that to me. I can eat, however, Japanese food, because it tends to be a little lighter on the MSG. At least around here. :3

[sue1234]

I guess I'll never know what caused this--I've never had a reaction to MSG or chinese before. My cardio never got back with me. That is a big problem--I have doctors that I don't bother hardly at all, but when I do need them, they don't get back with me. It's so hard to find a doctor that cares.

By the way, I am a little better today. Even though I thought it might be related to what I at that night, I still did a couple of other things:

1. I quit taking my thyroid meds for the last two days, as this vasodilating thing is making me soooo much more hot. It dawned on me that I have lost almost 20 pounds since January and have been taking the same dosage of thyroid meds. It could be that my usual dosage is too much for me now, even though I did not really have tachycardia or insomnia.

2. Those wonderful digestive enzymes got put on hold. That was the only new thing I had been doing for the last few weeks and they helped the stomach bloating greatly. I haven't taken them for 3 days. I hope they aren't causing this problem, as I feel I discovered how much I need them to make the bloating go away through proper digestion.

I hate not knowing about all this.

[Tammy]

Interesting that you tied it into your thyroid med. It took me almost 4 years to figure out that I needed to lower my dose a bit and it has helped in some ways. It really was weird because my TSH wasn't too high - like 1.7, but I asked my doctor to lower my dose just a little and he agreed to give it a try. Now I test at about 2.8 and things related to my throid issues are a bit better. I wouldn't stop taking your thyroid meds, just go into your doctor and ask him to lower your dose (a tiny bit)... like if you are on .88, go down to .75 and see if that helps after a few weeks/month. Skipping your dose isn't recommended by most doctors.

[MomtoGiuliana]

I 2nd that. Please don't adjust your thyroid treatment w/o talking to your dr. Most doctors will work with you on adjustments. It's not a good idea to try to adjust it on your own. I find it very hard to tease apart what of my symptoms are thyroid-related and what are POTS-related. The TSH test is very sensitve and while everyone has their own TSH range within which they feel best, it's hard to know without the tests.

Hope you feel better soon.